Awkward misunderstandings that you had as a child

I used to play with my mums tampons, I had no idea what they were. I'd line them up, make mazes and hang them off things with the strings

Fighting not fights.

Not me something my mum told me.

Her 2 brothers were fights T called J a Cunt. Their little cousin S over heard them and said. "Im telling Nanny". T said Oh no don't tell her. It just means you're a nice person.......Anyway fast forward to a few hours later S was happily playing with her dolls and she inevitably came out with " Awww you're a nice little cunt." . Needless to say my uncles get the wrath of their nans tongue.

Another one here who didn't realise the difference between twat and twit. My DSis and I were arguing in the back of the car, we must have been about 8 and 10 I think, and one of us called the other a twat. Cue DM telling us we shouldn't use that word. Of course we wanted to know why. DM wouldn't tell us, just said we shouldn't use it. After the twentieth or so chorus of 'but, whyyyyyy', she snapped and shouted 'because it means CUNT!'. We were utterly mortified and sat in silence the rest of the way back .

I thought a french kiss meant saying "mwah" when you kissed. Until the age of 14 when, during a conversation with a group of girl friends about when it's appropriate to stop kissing family members, I said "My sisters and I always french kiss, it's just a thing we do." Then the rumours of my family being a weird incestous cult started up... again.

I was about 9 when uncle Fred rang and asked me to let my mum know that uncle Joe had sadly died (not real names).
Uncle Fred was DM's favourite brother; uncle Joe was her BIL who'd been ill for some time. I wasn't particularly close to either.
Unfortunately I got the names mixed up and DM was in hysterics when I told her.
Took a few frantic calls to sort that one. (Who asks a 9 year old to pass a message like that on?).

When I was about 8 I overheard my mum refer to one of our neighbours as "always pie-eyed" (I probably thought it she liked pies so much it showed in her eyes). A few days later we were going up the stairs behind this woman and I said "Muuuum, what does pie-eyed mean"?

Neighbour probably didn't twig but my Mum was mortified and I got a stern telling off about repeating things I'd overheard.

Couple of mildly amusing ones - a university friend and I went to a museum in London and in front of the sculpture exhibition, my friend (quite loudly) asked how could I tell which was the male and which was the female figure? They were abstract sculptures, but not that abstract! Trying very hard not to laugh out loud in a very quiet exhibition room takes a lot of work .

The second one was my dad - apparently back in the mid-1950s, when he was at primary school, he and my grandma were standing in a queue at a bus stop and he (very clearly) asked "what's that lady got on her face?" The lady in question was wearing a full face of makeup (1950s style) and dad had never come across it before as his mother and sister didn't wear any . Different times; what was seen as quite rude back then just seems a bit cheeky nowadays...

I've not used the word knackered in company ever since I was told off for saying it, but I do wonder if its a slightly older generational thing where it has sexual connotations? I googled before posting and it seems that these days it is just used for meaning tired, but I read somewhere that it used to mean sexually tired.

I’m not going to change saying knackered just because other people are determined to turn everything into a sexual thing. To be honest it’s them that any embarrassment should fall back on.

Wtf I say knackered daily 😴

@Claudia84

What a lot of rubbish. A quick google of the derivation will tel you otherwise. People are confusing it with "knackers" meaning testicles.

Keep saying knackered. It's fine.

When I was about 8 I told my best friend she was a stupid twat. I'd overheard it and thought it meant the same as twit. I remember her Mum telling me very sternly to never use that word again

I got the meanings of ‘orgy’ and ‘mortuary’ mixed up. My older sister found it hilarious and told everyone at my 14th birthday party. I just wanted to die (and presumably end up in an orgy!)

Dh used to play a game with ds when he was very small. It involved stroking the child’s hand while saying “Soft Kitty, nice kitty” - or something along those lines (Dh is foreign and it’s a game from his country that you play with little kids). Then when the child isn’t expecting it, you switch suddenly to “Bitey Kitty!” and slap the hand instead of stroking it. Ds loved this game, and trying to predict when Kitty would get bitey and snatch his hand away.

Anyway one day Dh took ds into some public toilets in a museum, and whilst in the cubicle with him, ds suddenly piped up “Daddy can we play the stroking game?!”

Dh could not get out of there fast enough.

Wait, is knackered a sex word? I thought it just meant tired / worn out, like a horse going to the knackers yard. Have I been being crude my whole life?!

pussy cheese

At primary school my teacher told me to 'pull my socks up' Obviously now I would understand the meaning of this (weird phrase to use for a 7 year old anyway) but at the time I looked down at my white knee socks and hoiked them up as requested. I couldn't understand why she then got more annoyed.

Aged 9 or 10 in primary school. We'd just finished PE and getting changed when I loudly announced that I was "knackered". A shocked silence ensued and the teacher said that they didn't expect that kind of language from me. I'd heard it on TV and thought it simply meant tired, with no other connotations (ie being tired after sex).

As a pre-schooler I attended a playgroup held in a community centre. The staff said that next time we'd be playing on the space hoppers and I remember being worried about needing to take money with me as I thought they'd meant playing Space Invaders arcade game. (I'm fairly certain that the community centre did have arcade games as there was also a members' bar area.)

@VenusClapTrap 🤣